There are few categories that have embraced the digital age as completely as education. The student journey today can begin with a Google search, move to a YouTube explainer, continue through online reviews, and end with an application submitted entirely online. Institutions can target students by geography, course interest, exam intent and even browsing behaviour. On paper, quite literally, print should have become an increasingly difficult sell.
And yet, the education sector continues to buy it.
The latest TAM AdEx data offers a striking reminder of that contradiction. Print advertising space in India declined by just 2 per cent in January-July 2026 compared with the same period last year. But education emerged as the largest sector, accounting for 20 per cent of total print ad space, ahead of Services at 15 per cent, Auto at 14 per cent and Banking, Finance and Investment at 11 per cent.
At the category level, Multiple Courses alone accounted for 8 per cent of print ad space, making it the second-largest individual category. Coaching/Competitive Exam Centres contributed another 4 per cent, while Schools accounted for 3 per cent. Three of the top 10 categories therefore came from education.
For a sector selling the future, its continued dependence on a medium often described as part of advertising’s past perhaps indicates that print is no longer about mass reach alone. For education, it is about making the institution feel credible enough to be considered in the first place.
Why education still chooses print
Education is an unusual advertising category because the decision rarely belongs to one person, happens instantly or ends with the first impression. A student may be the ultimate consumer, but parents, guardians and sometimes other family members can influence the choice.
Prof Anand Narasimha, Dean, The Specialist Brand School and a veteran brand strategy expert, highlights this, explaining, “Education is a high-involvement, high-stakes decision, often involving the entire family. Print gives education brands something digital struggles to deliver—credibility, seriousness and a sense of permanence. For a parent evaluating a school, college or university, the medium itself can add to the perceived stature of the institution.”
Print primarily proves to be a strategic medium to reach parents. Ratnakar Bharti, Vice President, Mudra, elaborates, “While students increasingly search for institutions online, parents continue to influence the final choice. Print helps institutions reach this wider decision-making audience, particularly in regional markets, while building familiarity and reinforcing their reputation.”
Jyoti Chugh Bhatia, Group Director, Gozoop Creative, further notes that the length and complexity of the education journey is an important factor. “Education is a category where the decision-making journey is often longer, more considered and involves multiple stakeholders. Whether it is a school, university, professional course or specialised programme, the choice is rarely an impulse decision,” she says.
Education advertising, thus, is not simply trying to make a consumer notice a product. It is often trying to establish why an institution deserves to enter a consideration set in the first place. And that is where print can play a different role.
Anup Mathew, Senior Vice President, Media Solutions (Print), Mathrubhumi Group, emphasises, “Newspapers and magazines continue to offer a tangible, credible source of information to parents—from courses and eligibility criteria to admission dates and scholarships. For educational institutions, being present in established publications also helps build trust and legitimacy at a time when families are making significant, long-term decisions.”
The value beyond visibility
But print’s relevance to education is not only about the audience it reaches. The medium itself can lend weight to the message, particularly when the product being advertised demands consideration rather than an immediate response.
For Harish Bijoor, Founder, Harish Bijoor Consults Inc. and a business and brand strategy expert, there is something almost functional about the relationship between education and print. “Education is serious business. And any serious business needs a serious medium. Print, to that extent, is considered to be the most serious and reliable medium. When choosing an education product, you want to read the fine print. Therefore, functionally speaking, education advertising is best suited to print as a medium.”
That observation also explains the visual grammar of education advertising. Full-page advertisements, detailed course listings, eligibility criteria, admission dates and application information are not unusual. Bijoor adds that advertisers often use large-format print ads to stand out in a cluttered category. “Education advertisers run to print for big, full-page ads. You load the ad with a lot of fine print and detailing, which helps you distinguish yourself from others. Most education print ads end up looking like a brochure with a larger, mass reach.”
The point is that print gives the category room to provide information that may be difficult to compress into a fleeting digital format.
Bhatia makes the same distinction from a media strategy perspective. “Newspapers and magazines can lend a sense of legitimacy and permanence to an education brand, particularly when the communication is around admissions, new programmes, rankings, achievements or institutional milestones. For many institutions, being present in a credible publication also helps reinforce the perception that the brand is established and trustworthy,” she says. The medium, therefore, can function as a first layer of reassurance before a consumer moves elsewhere.
Print vs Digital
Print has historically been sold on its ability to reach mass audiences. But education’s continued dependence on the medium suggests that its value also lies in influencing a household rather than simply reaching an individual.
Nandkumar Dhake, Director – Admissions, Somaiya Vidyavihar University, draws a clear distinction between the media habits of parents and students. “Parents or guardians are generally in the age group of 40-55 years and students typically belong to the 16-25-year age group. The former category still reads newspapers. Print ads have relevant, decision-focused content compared to target-based digital ads, which have more catchy content and do not necessarily deliver decision-facilitating content.”
That creates an interesting difference between print and digital advertising.
“Digital ads are user-specific, so what is shown to different family members based on their content consumption patterns is different. But print carries the same ad for all, creating awareness amongst parents and students,” Dhake explains. That is a fundamentally different proposition from hyper-targeting. A digital platform can tell an advertiser which individual has demonstrated an interest in a particular course. A newspaper can put the same message in front of an entire household, even if none of its members had previously searched for that programme.
For education marketers, that distinction can matter because latent demand is important.
The regional and seasonal equation
If education advertising was simply about reaching India’s largest urban student populations, the case for print would be less compelling. But education demand is geographically dispersed, and institutions increasingly have to communicate around local admission cycles, state-level demand and regional programmes.
TAM AdEx’s language data reinforces the continuing geographic and linguistic breadth of print. Hindi publications accounted for 37 per cent of print ad volume in January-July 2026, while English contributed 29 per cent. Marathi accounted for 8 per cent, with Kannada and Telugu at 5 per cent each. For education institutions and brands, that regional layer can be especially valuable.
Mathew points to the substantial role of regional markets in education advertising. “We have seen a substantial share of education advertising coming from regional markets rather than national campaigns. Kerala is particularly significant, given its high literacy rate and strong emphasis on education. This makes the state an important market for institutions looking to reach both students and the parents who influence their educational choices. In this context, regional print and magazine platforms continue to offer institutions a trusted and relevant way to connect with their target audiences.”
Bhatia also emphasises that the print medium offers a contextual advantage. “Education advertising can be highly regional and seasonal, with communication often peaking around admission cycles, board exam results and academic calendars. Print allows institutions to reach specific geographic and demographic audiences at these important moments, while also providing the space to communicate more information than a typical digital ad,” she notes.
What education is really buying
Education’s share in print ad space points towards a simple conclusion—the category is one of the largest mass advertisers. However, the reality is more nuanced. Through print, education is buying attention, but also reassurance. It is buying reach, but also legitimacy. It is buying the ability to speak to students and parents at the same time. And in regional markets, it is buying proximity to communities where educational decisions are still deeply local. This points towards a shift in what print as a medium is actually expected to accomplish, beyond just mass reach.
Narasimha elaborates, “Print is no longer just about mass reach. Its bigger role today is about building trust and credibility in high-consideration categories. It plays a powerful role in establishing legitimacy and reputation.”
However, Bhatia cautions against reducing print to a ‘credibility medium’. It continues to offer scale. What has changed is how brands use that scale. “Rather than relying on print alone, marketers can use it to establish legitimacy and then use digital channels to drive research, enquiries, campus visits and applications. For education, therefore, the question isn’t really print versus digital. The more relevant question is what role each medium plays at different stages of a high-consideration decision journey,” she says.
Bharti also makes a case for integrating print and digital. “For educational institutions, both have distinct but complementary roles in influencing the same decision. Print’s evolving role is to combine relevant reach with credibility and familiarity, while digital enables institutions to engage prospective students, answer their questions and convert interest into applications.”
The 20 per cent share, then, may be less a sign of education resisting digitalisation and more a sign of print finding a different role within the education marketing mix. The medium may no longer be the default route to mass awareness, but for institutions selling decisions that involve time, money, family influence and long-term consequences, credibility still has currency. Print can put an institution in the consideration set; digital can take the consumer further down the funnel.
